Dance in the Rain
by moony391
Summary: Moonyverse. After a year of numbness following her mother's death, Lily finds a way to come back to reality that becomes a bad habit. MWPPL at 15. Rating for sexual scenes and language. Title from Panic at the Disco's "I Have Friends in Holy Spaces."


**Hello to you out there in fanfiction land. Yet another Panic! Moonyverse oneshot for all of you. This one is about Lily, and the title is taken from Panic's I Have Friends in Holy Spaces. Enjoy!**

_Dear Pathetic Little Book that I am supposed to write in,_

_I'm not sure exactly why I am following the suggestion of a ghost, but I guess that it's worth a shot. The Grey Lady_ is_ Ravenclaw's ghost, so she's probably smart enough that I don't have to worry too much about her advice being terrible… But I am writing in you, Pathetic Little Book, because the Grey Lady suggested it. _

_Here's the problem, though. I'm not sure what to write. _

_Shall I do the basic things?_

_May as well._

_Well, Pathetic Little Book, I am Lily. Lily Evans, age fifteen, forth year Gryffindor at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. _

_Erm… _

_I have red hair. And green eyes. _

_Um…_

_I have one sister, Petunia, who is a little over a year older than I am. She's a Muggle. She doesn't talk to me much anymore, not since I started school. She's convinced that I am a freak because I'm a witch… Severus says that I should just ignore her, but how do you just ignore your only sister? Even if she's being a bit of a prat. _

_Severus is my best friend, by the way. He goes to Hogwarts as well, but he's in Slytherin. We've known each other for a long time. He's the first wizard that I ever met. We aren't as close as we used to be, probably because we're in different Houses and all. Not to mention that, other than myself, Sev has rather crap taste in friends. This is to say that most of his Slytherin friends are completely horrible bigots who have no brains, but tons of money and therefore treat everybody else like second-class citizens. _

_But, generally, Severus is a great guy. _

_Let's see…_

_There's my dad. He's a Muggle too. He works for a Muggle business involving electronics of some sort. He's great, my dad. Nice guy, and totally fascinated by magic, which is rather refreshing after having to deal with Tuney all the time. _

_Then, there's…_

_Well, nobody. _

_My mum died about a year ago. She had cancer. _

_Well, Pathetic Little Book, I am rather done for tonight. _

_-Lily_

Lily put down the little leather bound diary. She sighed, standing up and stretching, before looking at the time. Seeing that it was nearly nine o'clock, she hurriedly stuffed her diary into her bag and snuck out of the Gryffindor Common Room quietly.

She met up with Mark in a deserted corridor, and returned to the Common Room about two hours later looking a little ruffled, but her eyes were dull and dead, more like if she'd just spent hours and hours listening to Binns lecture than hours snogging a rather fit six year.

_Dear Pathetic Little Book, _

_Had a date with Mark last night. _

_I can't see it going anywhere. So, when it was over, I told him that I wasn't interested in a second date. He seemed a little disappointed. Oh well. _

_I've dated a fair number of boys this term. Generally I avoid the male population of Hogwarts because, with the exception of Severus, the majority of them are rather annoying. Exhibit A: James Potter. Rich, pampered only child. Quidditch star. Master prankster. Arrogant Bullying Toe-Rag. _

_Most of the boys at Hogwarts are similar, if not identical in personality to James Potter. _

_Mark is one of the few who fall into the category of "decent." There aren't many people who fall under that category. In fact, I am nearly positive that there are less than thirty boys at Hogwarts who fit in there. _

_What a shame. _

_Yet, this year, the small pool of decent blokes appears to be growing, little by little. So, there is hope for me yet. Maybe, eventually, I'll find a decent one who I feel something for. _

_Then again, maybe eventually I'll just feel something. _

_-Lily_

Mary MacDonald was staring at her.

"What?"

"Lily, are you okay?" It was dinner time, and Lily had just realized that she was again the last person, other than Mary, sitting at the Gryffindor table. She hadn't touched her food, and the Hall was very nearly empty. She hadn't noticed.

"Yes," Lily said suddenly. "Just fine. Must have lost track of the time for a bit again… Lost in thought, you know." She smiled at Mary who looked unconvinced.

"You've been doing this a lot lately," Mary said. "Spacing out, not talking to anybody but that Snape, and then rushing off to meet up with another guy… What is with you lately?" She turned and left.

Lily shrugged. So, she wasn't especially observant at mealtimes and wasn't feeling particularly talkative with her Gryffindor friends. What exactly was the problem?

_Dear Pathetic Little Book, _

_You know, your name is getting to be a bit of a pain to have to write out all the time. From here on out, should I feel lazy, I'll call you PLB. That sound good?_

_...I've just come to realize that I am basically asking the opinion of a blank book. That's a new low for me. _

_I have nothing to say today. Might go study with Severus later. _

_-Lily_

Severus Snape looked up at the girl sitting across the table from him in the library after sitting in silence for fifteen minutes. He was, in all honesty, getting rather sick of Lily's new personality. Quiet and reserved, never saying anything anymore, always looking distracted.

She'd been like this for nearly a year now. Ever since her mother had passed away. He'd tried bringing it up to her, but she'd only become upset and told him to butt out.

He sighed again, his eyes following the path to what she was looking at. It appeared, Severus noted with distain, that the _what_ she'd been looking at was actually a _who. _He frowned. Of all of the things that Severus disliked most about the new and not-exactly-improved Lily were her habits involving boys. She always seemed to be staring after one or the other, and rumors were beginning to swirl around, claming that she had seen several boys rather intimately in the last few weeks, and not long after the long snog sessions that they were trying to pass off as dates, she would refuse to speak to them.

Severus's frown deepened. "Lily?" he said after several more minutes had passed.

She looked up at him as if the idea of conversation had never occurred to her before in her life. "Yes?" She looked like a pale impersonation of who she used to be. A duller, less life-like copy of Lily Evans. Severus couldn't bring himself to say anything to her when she looked so different, and so sad, to him.

"Never mind. I figured it out."

_Dear P.L.B,_

_Had Potter scream at me for a good fifteen minutes today because I told him to leave Severus alone. He was carrying on about how he was "justified" in his actions because he'd been provoked. _

_I honestly can't remember whether or not he was right about that. _

_I can't remember a lot of things recently, truth be told. I just keep finding my thoughts to be detached from where I am and what I'm doing. It just can't concentrate on anything anymore, it seems. _

_I lost track of time at dinner last night. I've been doing that a lot lately. Mary, one of my roommates whom I've never been especially close to or distant from, snapped me back to reality today, then gave me an earful. _

_Mary says I'm being distant and acting funny. _

_Mary is probably right. _

_Mary is also bloody annoying and nobody asked Mary for her opinion. _

_PLB, it's just… Well, for the past year or so it seems like it takes extra effort to pay attention to what's going on around me. At first, I preferred to just function on autopilot, I guess. It was easier. No, I just can't stop. I'm always on autopilot. _

_And being on autopilot means that I don't feel much anymore. Not pain or anger or sadness, but also not happiness or anything else that's pleasant. _

_I think I might be numb. _

_I can't really decide if that's a bad thing or not. _

_-Lily_

Lily couldn't remember what time it was, or how long she'd been there. She didn't know where her shirt was and why she was not wearing it. She couldn't remember how her bra had found its way to the floor from under her shirt. She was a little confused as to who exactly the boy she was straddling was at first.

Then, she had a vague memory creep to mind. His name was David. He was a fifth year Hufflepuff. He was a member of the Charms Club. He was rather cute, she recalled, when he had approached her in the corridor asking for a date. Nervous and flustered. At the time, he'd seemed like a perfect gentleman.

Now, with her skirt hiked up, his shirt unbuttoned all the way, Lily decided she'd probably been wrong about her first impression of David. No gentleman wanted to get this far into things on a first date. At least, Lily didn't think so. Her idea of a date was still, of course, the Muggle standby. Dinner and a movie. Maybe a good night kiss. Nothing more.

It definitely wasn't straddling somebody half naked in an abandoned classroom.

She decided to leave about twenty minutes later, after finally gritting her teeth and jerking the guy off so that he'd leave her alone.

Lily went back to her dorm feeling especially vulnerable and embarrassed in the wake of her behavior that night. It wasn't a pleasant feeling, but it was something.

_P.L.B, _

_I bite my nails. _

_If my mother could see me do it, she'd slap my hand right out of my mouth. _

_If she did that, I'd never do it again. _

_Mum was big on proper behavior. Being polite, proper manners, as well as morals and stuff. That was what Mum was good at. She taught Tuney and I to be "good girls." _

_I've always been one. _

_I dunno if I am still a "good girl." _

_I don't think that I am a "bad girl" either. _

_I don't know which one I want to be anymore. I dunno if I even want to be one of them, one of either group. I just want to be something… else. Something different than whatever it is that I am right now. _

_That's assuming that I am anything at all anymore. _

_Last night. _

_I gave some guy a hand job, because he kept begging me to touch him. I didn't really want to. I let him put his hands all over me because he asked if that was okay. I didn't really mind, but I wasn't especially excited about it. _

_It felt strange. _

_It was weird, and uncomfortable, and I just plain didn't like the way he was looking at my chest. Like it was something he wanted to eat. Or something. I don't know. _

_But, well. _

_It was kind of exciting, having all that adrenaline rushing around in my veins. _

_Shocked the hell out of me. _

_I haven't felt anything in so long…_

_And now, I bite my nails. _

_-Lily _

"How was your date last night Evans?"

Lily blinked in surprise, then frowned at James Potter's bespectacled face. She decided not to say anything, just narrowed her eyes at the boy a small amount.

Potter beamed nervously back at her. "I'm sorry; I know that it isn't any of my business. But, you were frowning the whole way back and I figured it had probably gone badly…" His face suddenly began to take on a light pink tinge in the cheeks.

"Is there anything I can help you with, Potter, or are you just going to stare at me stupidly all day?" Lily asked, her voice holding next to no emotion.

James's cheeks flooded with color and he stared determinedly at a spot somewhere beyond her left ear. "Well, actually, I was wondering if you had any plans for the next Hogsmeade weekend…" He looked up at Lily hopefully.

Lily stared at him in disbelief, before saying, "I'm busy." She said nothing else.

"Oh," Potter said quietly, looking discouraged. "Maybe next time then? Well…See you later, then." He stuffed his hands into the pockets of his robes and scurried away.

Lily stared after him in shock. She didn't notice the pleased expression on Severus's face. Then again, she didn't even realize he was standing next to her at all in her usual state of dazed mental numbness.

_P.L.B, _

_Sometimes, I think that I have slipped into the world of the terminally insane. _

_James Potter asked me out today… I think. _

_I turned him down. I honestly don't have plans for the next Hogsmeade weekend, but something about the whole idea of going out with James Potter seemed to just scream the word "wrong." _

_Maybe it's because I simply detest him. _

_Maybe it's because, well, he seems a little bit like the dinner-and-a-movie type. Even though he probably doesn't even know what the hell a movie is. But, that's the type of guy he is. Or appears to be. Even though he's generally an obnoxious bullying toe-rag, I know that he's genuinely a good guy deep down. Very deep down. He'd never use a girl on purpose, he and he'd never feel her up on the first date. _

_But it just seemed wrong, the very idea of going out with him…_

_It's probably just because I detest him as a general rule. _

_I dunno._

_I don't think I want dinner-and-a-movie. _

_I don't want to go on parent-approved, "good girl" dates. _

_I don't think that I actually even want to date._

_I don't want to be a "good girl."_

_I don't want to be a "bad girl" either._

_I don't think I know what I want. _

_I just don't want that, that safe dinner-and-a-movie with a "nice boy" who will give me a chaste kiss on the lips after walking me to my door and saying good night. _

_I dunno, P.L.B. It's all so confusing. I know what I _don't_ want. But I don't know what I _do_ want. It's frustrating. _

_Maybe I don't want anything. _

_Maybe I do. _

_The only thing that comes to mind is that night with David. I don't want him by any stretch of the imagination. He turned out to be a jerk, anyway. But, I think that maybe I want _that.

_The danger of getting hurt or embarrassed again. _

_That did… something to me. _

_I can't say that I liked it. _

_But it seemed to snap me back into the real world long enough to remember what it was like to be a living person rather than an autopilot zombie. _

_I just don't know. _

_-Lily_

As the Hogsmeade weekend rolled around, Lily decided not to go. She had nowhere to go and nobody to go with, as Severus had already made plans with the little cretins from Slytherin that he considered friends.

Lily wandered the castle for a while.

She lost track of time.

Eventually, she bumped into Dominic Point. He was a fifth-year Muggle-born, exceptional in all of his courses, and a complete loner most of the time. He had a bad reputation as a love-'em and leave-'em type of guy. He was a known smoker, and Lily knew nothing else about him.

So, she said hello.

An hour later, Lily found herself underneath Dominic on the floor of an empty classroom. His face was in her neck as her positioned himself above her. "You're sure about this?" he breathed heavily at her.

"Yeah," She responded. He grunted, and pushed himself inside of her.

The feeling was strange. There was some pain, and some pleasure, but it was neither wholly one nor the other. But she liked the way she felt herself cringe away from the sounds of his grunts. And the way that she was disgusted with the musty smell of the classroom, and the way that her skin seemed to be producing sweat in embarrassing places that Dominic could surely tastes as he laid kisses over every inch of her that he could reach. She liked the way that his experienced hands groped her breasts a little too roughly, and how she felt the need to tell him to be gentler but never got around to it.

Lily found sick pleasure in the fact that Dominic did not last for very long. He came, pulling out of her, all over her left thigh. She liked the way she was irritated by the sticky wetness there, and how she needed to clean it up because in his exhausted state Dominic couldn't remember the vanishing spell. She enjoyed the fact that her body ached from being invaded so intimately, and that she was rather frustrated because she didn't reach a climax.

Yet, most of all, Lily reveled in the fact that she had just lost her virginity to a complete stranger. And that the whole concept gave her a huge rush. And that she was feeling, really feeling something for what felt like the first time in a year.

It was freeing.

It was going to become a habit.

­­

* * *

_Pathetic Little Book, _

_I think that I may have officially become a slut. _

_In the past three days I have slept with four different guys. _

_I only remember two of their names. _

_The only thing that sticks out in my mind is that all of the told me that they hadn't ever before. In three days, I deflowered four boys._

_What's worse is that I only lost my virginity about a month ago. To Dominic Point of all people, who I never talk to and is in all honesty kind of gross looking. _

_But, I am afraid that I may have become a slut. _

_Only, I can't bring myself to care. _

_I know that news has probably started to circle around in the gossip pools about my bed hopping. I know that people will start to talk more openly soon. _

_I really don't care. _

_All I can think about is finding somebody else to fuck. _

_All I want is to feel them inside me, wanting nothing more than to feel that raw physical pleasure. It's an amazing rush. _

_And it keeps me sane, I think. _

_Before, I was numb. _

_Now, I can feel again. I'm alive again. Everything has returned to razor-sharp focus after a long year of being in fuzzy haziness. _

_I even think that I _like_ feeling guilty about it. I almost like the fact that my stomach ties up in knots when I remember that I promised Mum that I'd wait until I was married. I like the guilt when I remember, hours later, that the last guy I did has a girlfriend who I sit next to in Charms and has always been really nice. _

_I think I just like being a horrible person. Who sleeps around, wrecking relationships and breaking promises to her dead mother. That, in itself, is a rush. A feeling. _

_When I was younger, I did everything my mother told. I never once disobeyed one of her rules, no matter how stupid. If she said not to go outside in the rain, I'd be indoors for days until the sky was perfectly clear again. _

_Now, not only do I want to go out in it, I want to dance in it, sing at the top of my lungs in it! Shout the rooftops that I am not listening to what I am told and that I am dancing in the rain because I damn well feel like breaking the rules! _

_It's strange to say that I like being considered a slut. I like feeling guilty. I like sleeping around, if it gives me these feelings of total elation –this feeling of being so truly alive. I don't care what I'm feeling; I just care _that_ I'm feeling. Something. Anything. It's better than being numb. _

_It's amazing how much of a turnaround a life can make once you introduce casual sex. _

_-Lily_

As much as Severus valued his friendship with Lily, enough was enough.

She had given him a long explaination about an oddly shaped bruise just above her collar bone.

Severus wasn't buying it.

He knew what she was doing. He knew that she was sleeping around, luring would-be innocent boys to empty classrooms at night, shagging them senseless and never speaking to them again.

Severus had to admit that, though he thought she was being completely stupid about the whole idea, her choice of "conquests" was rather clever. All of them were older than her; none of them were in her House. It minimized the potential for one of her housemates to find out about her lovely little habit of bed-hopping. Unfortunately, it made it easier for Severus to find out. Especially after hearing that the sixth year Slytherin Prefect had "done" his best friend.

He was, frankly, a little disgusted by it. He was also more than a little jealous. Why was she going around shagging strangers when she had a guy she trusted so wholly in her life that was more than willing? But he pushed that question aside.

Ever since she'd started, everyone had noticed a change in Lily. She was like her old self again. Funny, charming, alive. It was as if time had been altered and she'd never spent a year numb in mourning of her mother. It was like she'd been accidentally turned off, and somebody had finally managed to locate the on-switch.

_P.L.B,_

_Had a date with some guy named Daniel from Ravenclaw tonight. We snuck into Hogsmeade and went to the Hogs Head. We had a few drinks and well… _

_-Lily _

Lily looked up from the book she was reading at dinner. "Yes?"

James Potter was sitting across the table from her, fiddling with a spoon. "Hi there, Evans. What are you reading?"

Lily raised her eyebrows at him and pointed to the gilded title on the front cover of the book before she resumed reading.

"Ah. _The Good Earth._ I've never heard of that," James said lightly. "What's it about?"

Lily frowned, placing a bookmark in between the pages and placing it on the table. "It's about a Chinese farmer and his life."

"Is it any good?" James asked.

"Not particularly," Lily responded. "It's not really bad either." She moved to pick the book up again.

James tired again to start a conversation with her. "What did you think of that last Charms assignment? I think I've pretty much got the hang of Summoning Charms now."

"Me too," Lily said, opening up the book.

James bit his lip and tired for a third time. "Lily, are you busy next Saturday?"

"Why?" She turned the page without looking at him.

"I was wondering if you'd like to-"

"No," Lily cut him off, slamming her book onto the page. "Whatever it is you are asking me to do,_ Potter_, the answer is no. I have no interest in spending my time with an arrogant, bullying,_ pathetic_ excuse for a human being like you. Leave me alone."

James was taken aback by her sudden change of mood from impassive to angry. "Okay," He mumbled, obviously embarrassed. "I'll see you around, Evans." He got up and left quickly.

_P.L.B,_

_James Potter has asked me out again. _

_I may have reacted a little too harshly by jumping down his throat about it. _

_Maybe he'll leave me alone now. _

_Saw Devon the other night… _

_-Lily_

Lily hadn't been doing anything out of the ordinary when it hit her. In fact, she'd been sitting in Transfiguration next to Mary MacDonald, taking notes and murmuring occasionally about possibly going shopping on the next Hogsmeade visit. Class was ticking by slowly, and when there was only five minutes left it hit her.

Truly hit her.

It was as if a huge semi-truck had driven out of its way to come and crash into Lily's chest, and she felt like she'd explode with all of the raw emotion that suddenly poured into her with the impact.

Her mother, her sweet, beautiful, kind mother had been dead for over a year. And she'd just felt the loss. It was new to her, so new, and the pain was so fresh.

Her Mum, the tiny woman with the long blonde hair and the bright green eyes who had followed her to school on her first day in order to take pictures of her walking into the building to commemorate the day on film, who had made Lily a cake out of banana nut muffin mix every year on her birthday because she'd known that banana nut was always Lily's favorite, who had taught Lily how to apply just the subtlest bit of make-up to enhance her eyes, who had always braided her and Tuney's hair before they went to sleep so that it would be wavy in the morning, who had accepted and embraced the fact that her daughter was a witch and was so proud when Lily had demonstrated her talents, who had held her tightly and whispered soothing words when Lily confessed that Petunia wasn't speaking to her, who had looked beautiful even to her dying day and never once looked like she was even a little afraid, was gone forever.

And she had been for a year.

And Lily felt it all so suddenly.

And the tears came before she could stop them, followed quickly by the sobs she couldn't keep in her throat. She was too lost in her own misery to hear McGonagall ask her what was wrong, or to notice when somebody began to escort her to the hospital wing.

Lily emerged from her pool of sorrows only when, in the comfort of the hospital wing, under the influence of a calming potion, she felt Severus put and arm around her. "You're going to be okay," he said quietly, "I promise."

"When did you get here?" Lily asked quietly, her voice still thick from crying.

"A few minutes ago," He answered. His voice turned bitter as he muttered, "You're little _friend _Potter came to fetch me from my Defense class."

"He did?"

"Yes," Severus said quietly, his voice hinting that he didn't want to talk about it much more.

"I'll have to thank him later," Lily said, feeling suddenly very tired. "Severus?"

"Hmm?"

"I miss her," Lily said it quietly, leaning her head against his chest.

"I know."

_P.L.B,_

_I can't say that I am feeling better. _

_I can't say that this is any worse than before. _

_All I can say is that I think I've officially exited the world of the numb autopilot zombies. _

_But, I don't know about anything else. _

_I've cut back a bit on my… shall we say "late night encounters." _

_Not totally._

_I still have a few._

_But I've cut back. If I kept up the pace I was at, I'd eventually run out of people. _

_I can't say that I've started to feel sorry about sleeping around. _

_Because, well, I don't. _

_I still like the rush I get from it. It still seems to keep me anchored here in the real world. But it's more like a reminder of how much better it is to feel than to be numb. I don't foresee any relapse into the land of brain-dead anytime soon. _

_I eventually did thank Potter for getting Severus for me. _

_Unfortunately, I think Potter might have mistaken my gratitude as a profession of my undying love for him. He's asked me out no less than three times this week. He doesn't seem at all phased by my rejection, just slinks off to his hidey-hole and comes up with another excuse to talk to me. _

_Oh well. _

_I actually don't mind the little nuisance when he isn't being a total prat. _

_I haven't got anything more to say, Pathetic Little Book. _

_But I'll keep you posted. _

_-Lily_

**Fin.**


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